the ultimate question

Mark gave you a detailed reply on your point about hydrodynamic sorting. If you feel it was in some way deficient it's only necessary to point out how.The thickness of a geologic layer is a function of many things, including the rate of deposition and the length of time that conditions remain the same. Limestone layers (chalk) are usually deposited in quiet, shallow seas from a persistent "rain" of organic matter. The Earth's Dynamic Systems by W. Kenneth Hamblin says:

Many plants and invertebrate animals extract calcium carbonate from water in their life process and use it to construct their shells and hard parts. When these organisms die, their shells accumulate on the sea floor. Over a long period of time, the shells build upa deposit of limestone with a texture consisting of shells and shell fragments. This type of limestone, composed mostly of skeletal debris, can be several hundred meters thick and extend over thousands of square kilometers.

Available evidence presents a number of extremely serious problems for the flood viewpoint. Floods do not lay down sorted layers. Floods do not lay down fine sediment. A single flood does not lay down multiple layers. A flood would not sort organisms by degree of difference from modern forms. A flood would not sort material into layers by radiometric age. A flood would not lay down oppositely magnetized adjacent stripes on sea floors.--Percy

Tranquility Base writes:

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But I still don't think anyone addressed the issue of why for 'thousands/millions of years' there would be red sandstone and then suddenly chalk for 'thousands/millions of years'. I really think this has to be hydrodynamic sorting although I don't deny the oranismal origin of chalk. Let's not sidetrack onto the bigger picture of the fact that you don't think the flood could generate much of the geological column. Let's look at this one issue for a minute.

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The sandstone would be laid down by shallow, turbulent coastal waters. Depth would depend on length of time the region was coastal. Limestone is laid down as already described. Transition from depositing sandstone to depositing limestone would occur through uplift or subsidence, uplift if the sandstone's on top, subsidence if the limestone's on top.This diagram from An Introduction to Grand Canyon Geology by Michael Collier makes clear just one of the many difficulties of the flood view. Mix sand and powdered limestone in water, stir, let them subside. You'll have sand on the bottom, limestone on top. You'll never get sand, then limestone, then sand, then limestone. Yet that's just what you get at the Grand Canyon: Compounding the problems for the flood view are the slanted layers at the bottom. They were originally deposited horizontally, then tilted as part of a mountain building process, then eroded flat before the more recent Grand Canyon layers were deposited on top. Try doing that with a flood.--Percy

Tranquility Base writes:

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Percy, your explanatin may be possible I just don't think it is compelling...

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That's nice, but it *is* the theory which explains the evidence. A recent world-wide flood, on the other hand, does not lay down sorted layers, does not lay down multiple layers, does do not lay down fine sediment, does not sort organisms by degree of difference from modern forms, does not sort material into layers by radiometric age, and does not lay down oppositely magnetized adjacent stripes on sea floors.

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The great angular unconformity of GC? We think the flood was a vast tectonic event and linked to rapid continental drift so we have no problem with rapid uplift and the generation of unconfromities. Having said that, most flood geologists assign those GC layers as creation week rocks.

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The GC layers are creation week rocks? Complete with fossils? God created sedimentary layers that take millions of years to deposit and that contain the fossils of organisms that never existed?I don't think this is the opinion of "most flood geologists" because the "God as trickster" viewpoint has been pretty consistently rejected by evangelical Christians.Rapid continental drift is contradicted by all the evidence, including the increasing radiometric age of the sea floor with distance from mid-oceanic ridges where sea floor forms, magnetic sea-floor striping, and the increasing depth of sediment on the sea floor with increasing distance from mid-oceanic ridges.The scenarios you're promoting are not suggested by the evidence, indeed are contradicted by it. You developed your scenarios in response not to evidence but to a particular interpretation of Genesis.--PercyPS - There's a tiny reply button in the row of links at the bottom of each message, including this one, ie, look down one inch from here. If you use that button your message will get annotated with a link to the message you're replying to. There are actually two such buttons, one that includes the message you're replying to in a quoted section.

Tranquility Base writes:

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I don't believe you have corroborated your statement that the flood can't do these things.

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You've got things backward. It's not up to me to present negative evidence but for you to present positive evidence. If your approach were valid I could claim there are invisible ethereal elephants living in your refrigerator and ask you to disprove it. Listen to Art Bell some night and try disproving some of that stuff.Current theory is consistent with the evidence. Your proposals, on the other hand, not only have no evidence, but in some cases even require physical laws to have been significantly different in the past. So far you have presented no evidence for the following:

• Changes in radiometric decay rates over time.
• Method of dispersing heat from rapid radiometric decay.
• Method of keeping rapid radiometric decay rate from killing off all life.
• Sorting of organisms by degree of difference from modern forms by floods.
• Neat layering by floods.
• Rapid reversals of the earth's magnetic field, on the order of once per hour instead of once every 1/2 million years or so.
• Incredibly rapid sea floor spreading with concurrent need to somehow not roast the oceans and the earth by introducing millions of cubic kilometers of magma in just a year.
• Incredibly rapid sea floor sedimentation.
• Most fossils were animals that existed at the time of the flood.
• Rapid motion of continents, kilometers/day.
• Method of dispersion of huge amounts of heat from proposed tectonic activity.

Moving on:

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I was unaware that the tilted great angular unconformity had fossils (other than microsopic stuff that could have seeped in)? Are you sure about this? I was under the impression that AIG and ICR agreed that this was creation week stuff (?)

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I didn't realize you were focused soley on the GC supergroup, which are the layers below the unconformity - you just referred to the unconformity and didn't say whether you were referring to the layers above or below.Regardless, the GC supergroup is *very* sparse in fossils - only algae is present. The same argument applies, however. Why would God create *sedimentary* layers complete with fossils?--PercyPS - Found that reply button, I see!